Question, where is it stated anywhere Ford wants the building? Maybe they just want the land?
Hi superwarp1
Ford Motor is going to refurbish the station, I would send you more information, but I am on my iPhone. There is a large power outage on my side of town.
Dear Trainroomgary,
The large power outage on your side of town is being caused by all of those transformers you have turned on to run your layout! Please turn them off so some of us little guys can have some fun as well!
I'm still waiting on Ford's announcement on this. Why I think it's great. I don't understand why Ford would spend what some estimates have stated a cool 300-400 million to restore this building. Why?
Businesses make decisions for a lot of reasons, and the idea that businesses only make decisions based on immediate profit and "shareholder value" (as much of a driving force that is, both for the good and bad and aweful) is one of those things that isn't true. I can't answer for Ford, but remember that Ford didn't just do this on some whim, I guarantee this went through exploratory committees, and it went in front of their full board of directors, and they had to make a case for it, it is why boards exist....in any event, why?
-Detroit has been showing signs of coming back to life, they are starting to see both the arts community come into the city, along with other elements that are harbingers of life coming back. Among other things, that generally means young, creative people might be willing to live in such a place, people Ford would need for what they supposedly are planning to do here. Things like clubs and restaurants and arts venues and all kinds of things, if it is happening in Detroit, could make it a great place to locate a venture like this.
-That building could serve pretty nicely as a place to attract start ups, it is an interesting building, it isn't exactly a suburban office park. I worked for a startup in a loft in Chelsea in NYC, it was a lot more fun working there (this was 2007- 2009) and I am an old fart, not that young, it was fun to be in a building like that. Among other things, a venture like Ford is planning is going to require other companies to develop things, if you are working on self driving cars, electric vehicles, it would be advantageous to have in the same building a company that could develop a prototype for a sensing system or a system to handle bad weather driving.
-With their tech in there as an anchor tenant, related to the prior thing I wrote, it could attract other kinds of out there tenants there, not necessarily in the auto industry, and eventually could end up filling the building with paying tenants, too.
-Some of it could be a form of corporate guilt/responsibility, the auto industry, fairly or unfairly, has taken a lot of shots for their role in the death of Detroit, and while I am sure it isn't the prime reason they are doing this, I am kind of certain from a PR standpoint this can help dispel the idea that Ford is only a cold corporate entity out for itself (and it would be in line with what Ford tried to do in the past, Ford I believe put up the Renaissance center in downtown Detroit in an attempt years ago to help revitalize downtown). There are likely people at Ford who are from the area and want to see Detroit come back, too.
-It likely won't cost them that total amount, I would be that they will be eligible for tax breaks and deductions and credits for building in a depressed area that will help offset that cost. They also likely got the building fairly cheaply, given the amount of work required and that the city was going to tear it down. 200 or 300 million sounds like a lot, but a new skyscraper without the interest this building would have can easily cost that, my company paid for the construction of a build around the turn of the 21st century in Times Square probably the same size as this building, and it cost then like 500 million. New office buildings of that scope don't come cheaply.
Again, just speculation, but business decisions are made around a lot of factors, and I would bet that some of it is based in the hope/idea that Detroit seems to be coming back from the ashes and from what I have heard it is starting already to attract young, creative people who may be attracted to a city redoing itself and isn't yet totally gentrified, sanitized and overtly expensive, and Ford may be banking on that with the other things. New ventures like Ford is planning, R and D, speculative ventures generally are a different mindset then if it is a firm of accountants or tax lawyers, and they need people that fit that.